Pinstripes
I have always seen a variety of pinstripes on Locomobiles and Stanley Steamers. The book, Genealogy of the Locomobile, lists a number of color schemes. I had chosen the "Brewster Green on Black" combination as the palette for mine. Of course, you also have to have Brass as a major color component.
I knew that my hands and eyes would not yield a straight line with any success, so I looked to others for adding pinstripes to my Lyka.
I looked at the various "sub-cultures" of the automotive community for inspiration and a source of artists. In Denver, you find custom car builders, mostly "Low-Riders" in the Hispanic community, also a large gathering of motorcycle enthusiasts. You have mountain riders, dirt bike racers, and of course - Harley Davidson and related cycle clubs. I looked to the Harley community and found a pinstriper named Jon Brock, Pinstriping by Brock. We talked last June and planned for getting together after the summer.
Jon maintains a residence and shop in Evergreen, Colorado and Sturgis, South Dakota. He has probably striped thousands of cars and bikes in his career. Over three days, fitting me in between calls from body shops, he added the final touches to my Lyka. I did learn from him the importance of planning. Basically, if you are going to stripe the tubular frame, do that BEFORE you add the rest of the body. He was not able to get his hand into the proper position to fully stripe the leaf-springs, and some of the tubular chassis got a single line rather than the rectangular shapes that you see in many pictures.
The end results - I love the look.
Jon uses a lot of masking tape, many times he will use it as a guide for his fingers rather than as a "paint block." He says he relies a lot on the feel of the brush as it travels along the surface.
Rear Deck - Luggage Rack
Looking at other Lykas, and the original Locomobiles (along with all the variants), I am not seeing a lot of storage of luggage - Meaning - "Those things you lug around." I know there is a wicker basket mounted on the back panel that covers up the burner, but I am not sure of any internal storage for tools, oil cans - Steam oils and parts lubrication, or jacks, etc.
So in looking at the Lyka, I see that at some point I may want to put stuff on the back deck. Since the deck is a large, flat, hi-gloss surface, I could see a lot of scratches in my future. To mitigate that, I looked at building a "luggage rack" area using strips of 1/2 round brass as "rub rails". I cut, polished and fit a number of strips in a pattern that looked good and I think will fit the need. I have also acquired some straps and loops to hold things in place.
Finally - I picked up a trunk to actually hold all the stuff. I will cover that in the next post.
And - Here is the result.
When the boiler shows up and it is time to build the piping and internals, I will remove the body panels and store them away in order to open up the frame access.
